All winter long, I keep my seeds in a large plastic canister with a tight fitting lid. I store them a cool place to hopefully keep them viable season after season. Now it's time to sort out the jumble and organize the packets into my index tabbed seed box for the upcoming seed planting marathon. I really need a separate box for all the big seeds, such as beans, peas & corn, which are a bit bulky for the indexed box. Dang, I was cleaning out a closet the other day, and threw away a perfect sized decorated box with lid! I didn't even think about using it for seed storage.

Being in an organizational mood, I pulled a big plastic storage box off the closet shelf and started sorting things out...keep or donate. There were several old paintings I had done way back when, probably 35 years ago or more. Most went into the Goodwill box, but when I came across the "Chicken Butts" I hesitated. I always loved that whimsical little painting! I called my youngest daughter and asked if she wanted it, as the colors would be perfect in her kitchen. Then I emailed her a picture. Just as I had decided a couldn't part with it, and it wouldn't look too bad on my kitchen wall over the telephone, Amy called back and said "I WANT it!" Now we both want it. I decided to give it to her, but if she ever decides she doesn't want it after all, I want it back!

"Chicken Butts"

So many things in that box. So many memories. How could I ever part with.......

Dear Grandma and Gandpa . This is for evre thing you have dun for me. I love you gise very very very very much an more love

......from granddaughter Alicia, who is now nearly 18 years old, written when she was in the first grade.

Although I have a few February planted seedlings growing in the house, tomorrow I'll begin the marathon planting that always takes place in March. My planting calendar shows me what lies ahead for the month. In/Out refers to direct seeding....whether the seeds will be started inside under lights or outside, directly into the garden.

I've taken Ed's advise and begun to presprout my next planting of spinach seeds. It has been two weeks since I planted 12 soil blocks with Space spinach, new for 2012 seed, and only four have managed to germinate. I now have another 18 presoaked seeds resting in a damp coffee filter, keeping warm in a plastic baggie on top of a shop light.

Many of February's seedlings have been moved from under the shop lights to the laundry room window. They seem just as happy there, as long as I remember to turn the containers every couple of days to keep the plants growing straight.

Moving some seedlings cleared up a lot of space on the grow shelves for the March plantings. I've decided to go with the 6-pack cells rather than soil blocks this time around, as I can crowd more plants into a smaller space (72 cells per flat vs 36 soil blocks) while waiting for the mini greenhouse in the garden shed to warm up enough that I can move some of them out there.

You don't know how close I came to just quitting this blog yesterday. Not only was I racking my brain over the comments problem, in between sessions at the computer with multiple changes to the blog template and settings, I was also moving furniture, cleaning out a closet, dresser and desk drawers, hauling out carpet and pad scraps and keeping an eye on son John to make sure he was installing the new bedroom carpeting to my satisfaction. While fixing lunch and dinner. Mr. Granny did start the day with a surprise for me when he came in with a couple of breakfasts from Jack in the Box. It's not that I'm that fond of those breakfasts, I much prefer a bowl of cereal and some fruit, but the containers they come in make great trays for soil blocks for seed starting, and the lids are perfect to use underneath the planters on the garden windowsill!

My dear long time cyber-friend, Teresa, came to the rescue with the blogger comment problem. She asked me "Have you tried using embedded comments rather than the pop-up box for them? In case you need it, it's under Settings>Comments>Comment Form Placement." That worked! I must say, I didn't know that would be any different than the popup comment box, but it is. It gave me back the option for follow up comments to be emailed to you, as well as adding a "reply" button, which I'm loving. No more long comments from me with all those ********between them!

While I'm still on the subject of blog comments, let me mention that my Firefox browser (an older version) doesn't show the comment box at all, but the "reply" option works. I noticed Erin had a commenter (Judy) who said she doesn't see a comment box. It does show up in Internet Explorer and Chrome.

OK, now that all is well (for now), back to business. It was only 19F here this morning, and we're expecting another storm to pass through tonight. More snow? Possibly. The weatherman is predicting 58F for Saturday, so there's still a chance the sod removal for the new garden plot can take place. I want to be planting peas and potatoes in about two weeks. C'mon, Mother Nature, we're ready to garden!

You may have noticed I changed my template today. For some reason, there is now no option to be notified by email if you get a reply to your comment. This is what my comment box (and most of those I visit) looks like now:

There used to be an option to subscribe to comments by email. That option disappeared today. In fact every Blogger page I visit is the same unless it has this type of comment box....

I played around with a new template in another (unused) blog of mine, and the it showed the lower (good) comment box. I changed my Annie's Kitchen Garden template over to the new one, but the old (bad) comment box came back....still no option to subscribe to comments. I imported this blog into that unused one and the good comment box was there, but as soon as I changed the name it went back to the bad comment box! I've cleared my cache, I've rebooted the computer, all to no avail. The only thing I haven't done is put word verification back on.

I am getting so frustrated with Blogger I imported the blog into Word Press, but not all of the comments transferred over, so I'm still working on it. If I get it up and running, and learn how to use it, I'll begin using Word Press instead of Blogger. Or maybe I'll just close this blog down and start a new one with a different name and link back to the old one. I'm too old to deal with all these recent blogger frustrations!

Yesterday, with visions of tomato blossoms and fresh baby lettuce dancing in my head, I felt as though spring had arrived! My dreams were dashed this morning, when I looked outside at two inches of snow on the ground. It was completely unexpected! My son-in-law, Bryan, has committed to Saturday to begin sod removal for the new garden plot. That might have to be put on hold.

Yesterday son John installed the new carpet in Mr. Granny's man cave. It looks so much better! I got such a good deal on a remnant that was exactly the right size to carpet not only that room, but a small bedroom as well! I hadn't planned on replacing that carpet, but the 12' x 29' remnant was less expensive than purchasing a 12' x 15' for the man cave alone. Mr. Granny and I moved all the furniture out of the room on Saturday, and we put down the new padding. Sunday we whimpered a lot about our old, aching muscles, and let John do most of the work. I think we'll wait for him to help move the furniture out of the bedroom today, although he moans and groans about his aches and pains almost as much as we do!

All that furniture moving and carpet laying wore Otto out.

I think I've solved the problem I was having with CAPTCHA. I've always had control over comment moderation, having every comment sent to me email. My email was inundated with spam when I removed word verification from my comments, and I was really tearing my hair out over it. Well, DUH! I stopped having your comments sent to my email! Blogger does a good job of removing the spam to a different tab, so now I don't have to look at it. I just have to publish the comments through Blogger Dashboard, rather than from my email. So.....for now at least, this blog will remain a word verification free zone.

Today I had my first harvest of "windowsill lettuce". I also transplanted the little onions into larger containers, and I kept the clipped tops to add to tonight's fresh salad.

The first pot gets a trim.

With the second pot harvested, we had enough for a nice dinner salad. We'll enjoy the 3 oz. of Red Sails lettuce.

I had a real surprise today. I planted four Mini Gold tomato seeds on January 26th. All four seeds germinated, and three of them had what I would consider normal growth. The fourth, however, went right to the head of the class and today, exactly one month from the day it was planted, presented me with a cluster of tiny flower buds! Is that fantastic growth or what? I just hope it doesn't drop its blossoms, which has been my luck in the past when trying to grow tomatoes inside.

You may have noticed that I recently removed the word verification from my blog. I, as many of you have, have not been leaving as many comments on blogs since Blogger decided to use CAPTCHA in place of the more user friendly "old" word verification. At first I left my setting so that anyone could comment, with moderation....that means I get an email for every comment, and can publish or not as I see fit. It didn't take five minutes for the spam to begin flooding my email account, so I changed it to not allow comments from "Anonymous". Unfortunately, this also blocks anyone who doesn't have a Google account from commenting. Laura, from The Modern Victory Garden Blog emailed me to let me know she was unable to leave comments now, so I enabled "Anonymous" posting again. Within minutes I was sent a link to see Hillary Duff in the buff (I can't even use the "n**e" word here, or spammers will catch it and inundate me with links). I'm not interested in seeing Hillary, or anyone else, in the buff. Really. So now I'm between a rock and a hard place when it comes to comments. I lose readers if I continue to use CAPTCHA, and I lose readers if I turn it off. Can you tell I'm losing my patience?

Robin is going to be so proud of me! I actually remembered to photograph a couple of meals for today's Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard, which is being temporarily hosted by Jody at Spring Garden Acre. I normally do incorporate foods that have been grown and/or preserved by me into most of our meals, but I usually forget to grab the camera. Sometimes they just aren't pretty enough to photograph. You know you all have those days when you dish up right off the stove.....don't you?

This week's meals weren't very pretty either, but they were very tasty.

Grilled turkey Kielbasa over sauteed cabbage, with buttered boiled potatoes and green beans. Only the green beans were home grown from the freezer, but.....

....dessert was a rhubarb strawberry crisp. Both the rhubarb and strawberries were from the freezer and grown in the 2011 garden.

Another dinner that didn't look nearly as good as it tasted was spaghetti topped with a pork cutlet and Mozzarella cheese. The sauce was made from tomato sauce from the freezer and home made (frozen) pesto. It was delicious! The corn, from the freezer, was locally grown (not by me).

I've subscribed to quite a few magazines in the past couple of years. They all, of course, have something to do with cooking and/or gardening. I've subscribed to Rachael Ray, Taste of Home, Better Homes and Gardens, Good Housekeeping, Family Circle and Woman's Day. An entire year of Rachael Ray gave me exactly one recipe that appealed to Mr. Granny and me. Taste of Home, which used to be my favorite magazine for recipes (I still have many copies from the late 90s-early 2000s) , might have given me a half dozen or so that I could have found on their website for nothing.Family Circleand Woman's Day weren't much better, but at least their magazines are less expensive. BH&G and Good Housekeeping are worth renewing, but not necessarily for their recipes. I still find most of them do not appeal to our tastes. Heck, let's face it.....we're old, and our tastes are old fashioned! We still like the foods we grew up with, the basic meat and potatoes. Fried chicken, pot roast and meatloaf!

Mr. Granny really started it all this morning when he mentioned how unappetizing a dish in our local newspaper's food section looked. He said it looked like "slop" to him (it was rizotto with mushrooms and smoked salmon). That sent us right into a discussion of the foods of our childhood, and sent me straight to the cookbook shelf for my stack of Pillsbury Grand National Recipes of the 1950s.

1951, 1952, 1953

1954, 1955, 1956 & 1957

I was surprised, after leafing through all of those books in my possession, to find most of the recipes were for cakes and cookies, quite a few for pies and desserts, but very few for main courses. The main courses were not the ones I remembered fondly from my youth or early years of marriage, but I sure do remember those cakes and cookies! I think the main dishes we enjoyed came in the later Pillsbury Bake Off cookbooks. I'll have to see how many of those I have in my collection.

I did mark a few recipes in the old books. Not the cookies, because I have no willpower....I am the cookie monster of all cookie monsters. Bake them and I will eat. And eat, and eat and eat. I have learned to bake them seldom, freeze them in small amounts, and (hopefully) keep my hands out of the freezer! I can pass on cakes, pies are appealing but don't tempt me nearly as much as cookies, and as much as I love yeast breads, warm from the oven, I do have some self control where they are concerned.

This was the only main dish that appealed to me in all those books. Beans (canned) and wienies, of all things!

When things begin to go wrong, it seems as though everything goes wrong. I even titled this post "January 20".

What to do, what to do? I've shared photos of one of my granddogs with you before. Little Kobi is so precious to us, and even more precious to the humans he owns. He's eight years old, and the love of their lives. Well, last week Scott drove to the bank, and when he got out of the car Kobi jumped out unnoticed. It wasn't until Scott got home, about 15 minutes later, that he realized the dog was gone. He went back to the bank to look for him. I guess he approached a woman across the street who said she saw the dog, and that someone in a blue van drove up, opened the door, and the dog jumped in. She was sure it was his dog, she described him and even identified his leopard print collar. Really. She saw the collar across four lanes of traffic. And actually made note of it. Scott went back later to ask her more questions, and he said it took her a very long time to come to the door and he heard several dogs barking inside. He was quite suspicious of her story.

Of course we've been driving around the area every day, and have printed out and distributed a bunch of fliers. This morning a woman called to say she remembered seeing the dog that day. She took special notice, because he was so cute and was wandering around the parking lot (she was in the bank drive through). She said a Hispanic male walked over and picked him up and walked toward the front of the bank (the direction of the house where the woman who saw the "blue van" lives). She also said there was no blue van at the bank at all, just a black car.

Shortly after the first phone call, daughter Amy (her phone # is on the fliers) got another phone call. This time it was from a Hispanic male, who said "I have your dog, and I want $500." She asked where she could meet him to pick up the dog, and he hung up. No phone number, the number was blocked. Of course, there is no way to know if this person actually has the dog, or if he'd just arrange to meet someone and then rob them. Although a reward was offered on the fliers, no amount was given. Scott did, however, post on Facebook that they'd pay $500 to get the dog back. Ha! Like he has $500....he's disabled and unemployed! (Mom? Dad? Please?)

The police were already contacted about the dog the day he went missing. Of course there's nothing they can do, other than have a record of the report, as nothing criminal had happened. They were also called after the last phone call, as this could turn into either a dangerous situation or downright extortion.

In the meantime, we're all worried sick about Kobi. Now we're quite sure it wasn't some nice family that picked him up so he wouldn't get hit by a car, or probably not even someone who just wanted him because he's cute. It's more likely someone who will try to get money for him, any way they can.

On a less serious note, the other thing that went wrong was the new living room furniture I bought last summer. The sofa and love seat (not a cheap set) had "down stuffed cushions". Well, the "down" turned out to be feathers, and they work through the fabric and poke you in the butt when you sit down. Not to mention feathers all over the living room. I finally pulled the covers off and encased the inner cushion and feathers in large plastic garbage bags. You can imagine how uncomfortable those were to sit on, besides the fact the covers wouldn't stay on straight due to the slick plastic underneath. And every time someone sat on them, the air would rush out of the bags and make embarrassing sounds. I finally decided I had to do something, so I bought a roll of some 1-inch thick stuff called Nu-Foam, which is a woven fabric that is used in cushions and such, and supposed to be better than foam. To fit inside the covers, it had to be sharp around the edges, yet puffier through the seat area where the feather filling was. That meant cut it to fit, then hand stitch it to the inner lining. A time consuming, back killing job.

I'm only on my second cushion, and there are a total of five on the sofa and love seat. It cost $50 for one roll, and there's not going to be enough to finish. I'll try doing just one side, and put a less expensive quilt batting on the other side and just make sure the quilt batting side is always on the bottom. Hardly anyone sits on the love seat, so maybe I can get by just using the quilt batting on that. I'm so unhappy with that set, I wish I could return it to the store. The store that went out of business while we were down in Arizona last fall.

Four of the shelves now have full sized 4' lights. I bought two of them this week, which means I might not have to "borrow" the shed lights this year. Unless I get really carried away with planting, which is always a possibility. Three shelves are already filled, so the lettuce will probably be moved to the laundry room and put under the 2' light soon. Actually, it could probably go out on the front porch most days now.

I have decided to keep all four of the Mini Gold tomato plants that grew. I had only planned on trying to keep one growing inside to maturity, which will be the big one on the left (they were all planted at the same time). Now I think I might try to keep the other three growing until they can be planted out on May 1, and I'll put them in my three front planters....the ones that have always held flowers in the past. I'll plant them as Ed suggests....the tomato as a "thriller", some Dark Opal basil as a "filler" and sweet allysum as a "spiller".

The Southport White Globe onions aren't doing so great. They don't seem to have many roots, and fall over quite easily. This container was planted with 80 seeds, and I'll be lucky if half that many survive to be planted outside. The identical container, with identical seeds, never did sprout any seedlings. I finally scraped off the top layer of seeding mix so I could reuse the rest of it, and noticed two tiny sprouts. I ended up scraping that layer into a pot outside. Maybe something will eventually take off.

I should be eating fresh baby Red Sails lettuce in a week or so!

The Tall Utah #527OR, Improved celery has been thinned to one per Dixie cup. It's growing well.

Parsley, Parris Island Romaine lettuce and Chioggia beets.

More beets. This is my first try at starting them indoors. Most have been repotted into individual Dixie cups, but I'm not so sure it's not a waste of expensive seed starting mix to plant them individually like this. I probably should have done them in six pack cells and just snipped off the extra seedlings.

More beets.

And another planting of lettuce, Wild Garden Mix from Ed, just beginning to show.

Not shown:

Several Dixie cups of Johnny Jump Ups from Debbie Clegg. I was surprised at how quickly they germinated! I thought they'd be really slow, like the parsley, but they were up in six days.

24 soil blocks of Harris Model parsnips, not yet germinated.

12 soil blocks of Tyee spinach, the first one germinated today.

2 Dixie cups each of parsley and New Zealand spinach. I didn't think the first planting of parsley was going to grow, so I planted more. Now, like last year, I'll have way more than I can use.

I told Robin I wasn't going to join in on yet another special posting day, as I really prefer my blogs to be impromptu and about whatever subject happens to be on my mind at the time. I even hesitate to join in on Monday Harvest, as I'd prefer to blog about each harvest on the day it takes place.

But.....I *heart* Robin and Daphne, so I will do what I have to do. I think I will change my format a bit this year by blogging daily about the harvests, then doing a condensed version of the entire week on Mondays, and Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard isn't much different than my usual "Garden Dinners" posts, so I'll try to be a good Granny and contribute on occasion. Just don't expect me to be too good!

I usually cook meals that contain something that I've grown and/or preserved. I haven't been very good about photographing my meals through the winter, I just don't have the enthusiasm for it that I do when the garden is in full production. I did, however, remember to photograph one dinner this week....

The too thick pork chops I buy from Costco have to either be butterflied or cooked in the crock pot. This time I chose to crock pot, and used home canned tomatoes and home grown red sweet peppers from the freezer. The broccoli was the last of what was grown and frozen last year, and the parsley buttered noodles were prepared with home grown and dried parsley. Not shown are the frozen (thawed, of course) sweetened strawberries that we had for desert. They taste so much more like real strawberries than those I can buy, and probably have about half the sugar.

I got the jury summons just over a week ago, and my term was for two weeks. The first week passed, and I was not called to serve. I thought I was home free, but it was not to be. I called in last night to find I must report at 8:30 Monday morning, when they will select jurors for an upcoming murder trial. That means, if selected, my "two weeks" of service could extend for weeks! Please do not chose me, please do not chose me, please do not chose me......

Woe is me, but woe-er is my daughter. Amy was redoing her kitchen at the same time I was redoing mine. In fact, it was she who talked me into putting the laminate flooring in the kitchen. She just finished hers last week, and it turned out just beautiful. Her floors were much prettier than what I'd installed. Then it happened. Her garbage disposal plugged up, and she kept running water into it to flush it out. It seemed to be working, but what she didn't realize was that she was just pumping all that water into the dishwasher, as it had nowhere else to go. When she opened the dishwasher, the water poured out all over her newly (less than a week) installed flooring. It went behind the dishwasher, behind the cupboards, and everywhere. She threw towels down to try to sop up the mess, which may have even worsened the problem by keeping the flooring wet. Well, it soon began lifting and buckling. At first it ruined about a fourth of the flooring, then expanded to half. They keep pulling it up, and they are still finding dampness. Needless to say, she is just sick about it. She's the one who caught her kitchen on fire last year, now this! We have nicknamed her Fire & Water.

These buns! Pretty ugly, huh? Wilderness posts such good sounding meals and recipes, I decided to give her Potato Bread recipe a try. I tossed everything in the bread machine, just as she had them listed (I used 1/2 cup of warm mashed potato), until I came to the flour. Oh, dear.....it didn't look like I had three cups in that canister! Sure enough, I was at least 1/4 cup short, and not a bit more flour in the house. Oh, I had some whole wheat flour, but Mr. Granny won't eat anything but white bread. Well, of course I decided to go ahead with the recipe with what flour I had on hand. It was really soft and runny when it finished the dough cycle, so I oiled my hands and dug in. Honestly, this was as smooth as I could get them.

They were still quite lumpy looking after rising. Oh.....I had a pot of ham and bean soup simmering in the crock pot, so I removed the lid and put a cookie sheet and a cutting board over the top and put the covered rolls on them to rise. It worked great! The cutting board kept them from getting too warm.

Not the loveliest buns I ever made, but they'll do.

Oh, my...will they ever! The texture was a bit course, due to the too soft dough, but the flavor was divine. The recipe is definitely a keeper. Thanks, Wilderness!

Mr. Granny was in his Man Cave, engrossed in a movie, so I dined alone at the kitchen counter. Ham and bean soup, Waldorf salad, iced green tea and "rustic" buns with real butter. It doesn't get much better than this.

I had previously received this award from a dear blogging friend, David P. Offut, back in September of last year. For that reason, I'll not bore you with more facts about myself, which you can read here, in my original response.

That being said, I want you to know that no matter if I receive an award once or a hundred times, it's just as special to me each and every time. Some bloggers hate these awards. I have been publicly chastized for passing them on to some blogs that I especially enjoyed. I no longer follow those blogs, because I am shallow that way, LOL! I love getting the awards. I enjoy knowing there is someone out there who appreciates my blog enough to take the time to send me an award. So, thank you to Mrs. Pickles, and a belated thank you to 1st. Man. I love your blogs, too!

The roots of the lettuce seedlings I started for my "windowsill garden" were beginning to grow out of their soil blocks, so I decided it was time to pot them up. I looked at Walmart and Shopko for some lightweight plastic pots that were short enough to fit under the lights and wide enough to hold at least four lettuce plants. I found nothing, just tall round pots. I found exactly what I wanted in a long narrow pot at Fred Meyer, but it was $7, not including the drain tray. My cheap frugal self opted out of that one. Off to the dollar store, and once again I found exactly what I was looking for. A dollar apiece, I bought four of them.

They had no drainage holes, so once again I got out my trusty hot glue gun. I've ruined many pots using a drill to put in the holes, but this glue gun is foolproof on lightweight plastics.

My bathroom has become my potting shed. You know you have a problem when you have to wash the potting soil from your toothbrush before brushing your teeth! Hey, a girl has got to do what a girl has got to do when it's freezing outside!

A plastic fork, with the outer tines broken off, was a perfect tool for removing the small seedlings for transplanting.

Eight Red Sails lettuce plants are comfy under their temporary 2' light. The 4' shop light fixtures were on sale at Fred Meyer this week, for only $8.99 each. Of course, they were sold out. I got a rain check.

I have to buy some cupcakes. I don't want the cupcakes, but the bakery container that held my birthday cupcakes is absolutely perfect for securely holding these small Dixie cups. I can just pour a bit of water in them to bottom water the plants. Daughter Amy said she'll bring a dozen cupcakes for our Valentine's Day dinner......she's such a good girl. Anyway, I transplanted 8 celery seedlings into the cups, and four Mini Gold tomatoes. I wanted one tomato plant for the windowsill, so what did I do? I planted four seeds to make sure I'd get one plant. Yes, every seed germinated. What will I do with four Mini Gold plants?

The green things that are growing in my bedroom.

OK, tell me why. Close to 100% germination on these onions. They are 1-2" tall already. The very same day I took another identical container, filled it with the identical planting mix, seeded it with the second packet of the identical variety of seeds that were from the same company (Mike the Gardener's Seeds of the Month Club) that had arrived in the mail on that very same day, covered it with identical plastic wrap and set them side by side on the same shelf. In other words, there was no difference at all in the two plantings. The second container has failed to germinate a single plant! Beats me!

Don't you just love it when you happen upon a new blogger, with a brand new house and a garden in her dreams? The other day I had a comment from Christy, at My Garden - Our Life, so on a whim I checked out her profile, which led me to her new blog. I'm all excited about following her and her husband on their venture of making their new house a home. Check it out, maybe you would enjoy the journey.

Speaking of new beginnings, I must admit I'm a hoarder. I think it was about a week ago that I commented on another blog, saying I am NOT a hoarder, but I really am. It's just that my hoard is well maintained and hidden behind closet doors. I have a hoard of genealogy papers. I have a filing cabinet stuffed full of census, land, marriage and court records. I have an 8' (it might even be 10') shelf packed with books and binders, all stuffed full of 20 years of genealogy research. Well, I had to paint that closet yesterday, and I decided it was time to get rid of the hoard. Everything, well just about everything, has been entered on the computer, and nobody in the family is really interested in taking over the collection....and I burned out on it a couple of years ago. I decided it was time to bite the bullet and drag out the trash can. I'm printing out complete books for the two grandchildren who do show a bit of interest in it, and I will retain all photos and copies of important documents, but I'm going to donate the hard back research books and everything else will be shredded and disposed of. It hurts....20 years of work looks like a lot on paper, not so much on a computer program.

I painted Mr. Granny's man room yesterday. It's kind of fun to look back at the changes, although this room really hasn't changed much since my last child flew the nest and gave over her bedroom to her Dad. It's been his room since the 90s.

In the 90s it was a bit girlie, but Mr. Granny didn't seem to mind.

Around 2006 I "manned it up" a bit with the green walls and the removal of the flowered curtains.

Yesterday the walls turned to a medium beige. So far the valance is staying, as it has beige and green stripes that match the chairs and walls. I'm contemplating its removal, and possible replacement with a brown window blind.

For years he's been complaining about the glare of the light through the window as he's trying to watch TV. I don't know why I didn't just rearrange the furniture to get the TV away from in front of that window. That was where the TV cable happened to come in, but it took me about 30 minutes to reroute it to this wall. Much better for TV viewing! Mr. Granny did, however, call me in from the kitchen to tell me the light from the window was reflecting on the TV and making a glare. Sheesh, I had to drop everything to close the blind for him! You'd think he could have done that himself :-(

The next project will be new carpet for this room. I think son John and I can manage to install it ourselves.